But The Greatest of These is Love!

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” (1 Corinthians 13)

We have been learning so much at Africa Based Orientation!
One of the first things we learned about was worldview. My favorite definition of worldview is the lens through which we see and interpret the world. This lens is formed by your experiences with family, friends, culture, norms, etc. So we came to Kenya with the worldview of a westerner or more specifically an American. And we are trying to interpret the worldview of our fellow African brothers and sisters, through our western lenses.
Duane Elmer in Cross Cultural Connections gives us some sage advice, which is to keep in the forefront of our minds that other cultures are not wrong, just different. I know some of you might take offense at that advice, because clearly some practices in other cultures are wrong (like polygamy). Elmer addresses this conundrum far more eloquently than I can. In short, Elmer challenges us to distinguish between cultural practices that are right, wrong, or a matter of preference using the Bible as the measuring stick. Too often I think we blur these lines and at times even completely miss the mark, thereby categorizing a cultural practice in such a way as to cause unnecessary discord. Dare I mention our perception of church worship… more or fewer hymns, lifting our hands or keeping them restrained, dancing or standing resolute, beige carpet or blue carpet... I digress!
Most recently we had the privilege of learning more about Islam from an African scholar, Derek, who had an exceptional command of both the Bible and the Koran. We also had the opportunity to visit a mosque and have a Muslim gentlemen teach us about his faith. The greatest take home point we gleaned from Derek was how to better love our Muslim brothers and sisters.

If you are like me, your knowledge of Islam is confined to sound bites from popular media streams. Keywords gleaned from these sources and associated with Islam might be Osama Bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, The Taliban, 9/11, and Mosque. While we download this information from popular media into our minds we get a false sense of being informed, but how informed are we really? Is there anything else we need to know about Islam? Might we benefit from sitting down with a Muslim brother or sister to have an honest dialogue about our faith?
Here are some practical highlights of what we learned:

• The most important way to share His love is through friendship and relationship
• Listen to your friend
• Ask questions of genuine interest
• Avoid Confrontation
• When in doubt, glorify God!

These concepts could be applied to any relationship. I think we often fear sharing God’s love with others because of a feeling of inadequacy…I don’t know the Bible enough, I can not speak eloquently enough, I am poor at arguing…and you may be right on all accounts, but what does God ask us to do? Surely, we are not responsible for changing hearts…we just need to love well and when the opportunity arises speak truth with love and gentleness. We have full access to the Truth in God’s Word. So, join with me on this journey of loving well and sharing God’s Truth through the relationships that God brings into our lives.
Michael